Posts Tagged ‘Malachi’

The principle of firsts…

Posted: June 9, 2013 in His Word
Tags: , , , , , , ,
0

Welcome to church!!

Two weeks in a row at Hillsongs, just the dose of sanity for what was a practically horrible month of May.

Dont remember the Pastor’s name but the title of his sermon is the title of this post (I always make it easy for you don’t I?) and it dwelled on tithing and the ‘Principle of Firsts’.

The text was Exodus 13: 1-2; it says “The Lord said to Moses, 2 “Consecrate to me all the firstborn. Whatever is the first to open the womb among the people of Israel, both of man and of beast, is mine.”

And then verses 12 and 13 ” you shall set apart to the Lord all that first opens the womb. All the firstborn of your animals that are males shall be the Lord’s. 13 Every firstborn of a donkey you shall redeem with a lamb, or if you will not redeem it you shall break its neck. Every firstborn of man among your sons you shall redeem.”

Three things about firsts we need to be aware of today (and every other day)

1. The firstborn must be sacrificed or redeemed.

Lamb = Clean (sacrifice), Donkey = unclean (redeemed)

*Jesus was born clean, we were born unclean, Jesus was sacrificed so we might be redeemed.

Tithing is the only aspect of our Christian walk that God invites us to prove/test this. Malachi 3:8-12

2. Proverbs 2:9-10. The first fruits must be offered.

Proverbs 23:19

*Anywhere God talks about tithing in the Bible He says “bring” not give because you cannot give what you don’t have. It’s His anyways. If we consider that a commandment/giving back to HIm what originally is His, we’d do a lot better with giving our tithes first.

Genesis 4:3-5 – The reason God accepted Abel’s offering over Cain’s was that Abel brought the first-born of his flock but Cain brought any fruits.

There are some things God cannot do. Like even if He tried, He can’t do these things.

  • God cannot change (Inimitable)
  • God can’t think the way we think (Omniscience)
  • God cannot be second (Pre-eminence)

3. The tithe must be first! First! First! Not second, not third on your list to do when money enters your hand.

Leviticus 7:30 – “His own hands shall bring the Lord’s food offerings. He shall bring the fat with the breast, that the breast may be waved as a wave offering before the Lord.”

Exodus 13:14-15

* It’s the first fruits. First fruits. Not the money left over. May God bless the reading and understanding (and the doing) of His word, amen.

P:S 1- Note that I didn’t go into the ‘who does the tithe go to’ argument because I believe that my tithes go to the Lord and my blessings come from the Lord. #EndOf

P:S 2 – Starting next week, I’m not going to write out a load of the scriptures for you anymore, bring your Bible!! Open it!! Read it!!

 

Related articles